Sunday, August 13, 2006 | Canton Repository

Alliance Wants To End College Zoning

By Malcolm Hall, Repository Staff Writer

ALLIANCE Mount Union College is on the verge of losing one element that distinguishes it from the surrounding city — special zoning.

Alliance plans to revise its zoning code and the plans include the end of college zoning.

Instead, most of the campus will fall under residential, single-family zoning, with some of the outlying area governed by the mixed-commercial zoning category. This would allow for a variety of retail outlets — hopefully those which would complement Mount Union and nearby Alliance Community Hospital.

By eliminating the college zoning category, city officials would make it possible for Mount Union to expand beyond its current boundaries without seeking a zone change. In other words, there would be no need to change residentially zoned parcels to college zoning.

And for the residents surrounding Mount Union, college expansion would not require the affected neighborhoods to lose their residential zoning classification.

College officials only have to get a conditional-use permit if their plans fall outside the regular zoning.

A consulting firm, McKenna Associates, guided city officials through the upgrade of the zoning code. One focus was to help the college and city better co-exist.

The new code should “provide a way for the city to protect surrounding residential areas from an influx of off-campus multifamily conversions of single-family housing,” said McKenna Vice President Robert Kagler.

At the same time, he said, the changes will “provide a way for the college to grow in an orderly manner and meet the needs of its growing enrollment on campus.”

“The difficulties communities have with the institutions come when the institutions want to grow,” he added.

“The problems that arise in the neighborhood results when some of the students decide to live off-campus. When you move into neighborhoods with middle-age people or elderly people, there are lifestyle differences.”

Price chairs council’s Planning, Zoning and Housing Committee, which is reviewing the proposed revisions.

“The college has worked with the city in the language of the code,” said Patrick Heddleston, vice president for business affairs at Mount Union. “You take away the college zone, there is always going to be some concern. In working with the city, we feel the language will be sufficient. We think it is going to be adequate for our future as well.”

Mount Union is planning to build college-owned apartments and town houses for students. It will build three apartment buildings in the 1400 block of S. Union Avenue and two town house structures in the 600 block of Hartshorn Street.

That should address some of the concern regarding college students living off-campus and encroaching into city neighborhoods.

“What we are trying to do is develop the type of housing our students desire. It is driven to make our campus more residential. ... Part of our mission is to be a residential campus.

Reach Repository writer Malcolm Hall at (330) 580-8305 or e-mail: malcolm.hall@cantonrep.com